


Relay Race

by gardnerhill



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Community: watsons_woes, Gen, Prompt Fic, RPF
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-01
Updated: 2014-08-01
Packaged: 2018-02-11 08:15:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2060721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gardnerhill/pseuds/gardnerhill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s not so much a <i>role</i> as it is a <i>trust</i>, handed down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Relay Race

**Author's Note:**

> For the 2014 July Watson’s Woes Prompt #31, brought to you by LAST REGULAR PROMPT OF JWP 2014!!!: **The End in the Beginning.** Every story's beginning is some other story's end.
> 
> **Author’s Disclaimer:** The names are real; only the facts have been made up.

_You may marry him, or murder or do what you like with him_.  – A. Conan Doyle

Smiling, the actor and playwright laid down his written blessing, and set pen to paper.

A few liberties, besides the love story: in chief, a calabash pipe which made emoting easier on stage, and compressing a few of the author’s original retorts into the four-word “Elementary, my dear Watson”; the deerstalker from the Paget illustrations made into a London-dweller’s fashion rather than a country accessory.

The critics sneered. But the audiences crammed the theater and extended the run, leading to a world tour.

And William Hooker Gillette was a star.

***

The ten-year-old boy stared in enthrallment at the great actor holding the Lyceum captive with just a pose, or a look.

That dignified bearing, that keen intellect, that perception – Mr. Gillette was _perfect_ for the role. This trip to London to see the famous play was the best birthday present he’d ever gotten.

“Do you like it, Phillip?” his mum whispered.

“It’s brilliant!” Phillip St. John Basil Rathbone gushed. “I want to do that when I’m grown!”

***

Poor Nigel Bruce, always the buffoon to Rathbone’s masterful Holmes. Oh, he’d loved the films when he’d been ten, laughed at silly old Watson’s blunders and Holmes’ wry, affectionate chastisements.

But he himself had worked in the Watson trenches, so to speak, opposite Charlton Heston of all people as the sleuth for the L.A. run of their play.

No – back to the books for this production. So back to the books he went as well. His Watson would be his partner, his detecting apprentice, his equal. And he would strive to be the most accurate Holmes ever.

Peter Jeremy William Huggins (Jeremy Brett in the credits) made more notes in the page’s margins.

***

_Goodbye and good luck. And believe me to be, my dear fellow…_

The ten-year-old boy sniffled as the Granada credits rolled to the sombre version of the Baker Street theme.

His mother picked up the remote and turned off the telly. “Ben?”

Ben wiped the tears away. “It’s just so sad, Mummy. They love each other so much. And now they’ll never see each other again.”

She smiled and kissed her son. His fearlessness at expressing himself showed the world he was a child of actors – one who might some day outperform both his parents. “Benedict Timothy Carlton Cumberbatch, I wouldn’t count on that.”


End file.
